


Russian Roulette

by SegaBarrett



Category: Breaking Bad
Genre: Heroin, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Withdrawal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-11
Updated: 2013-10-11
Packaged: 2017-12-29 03:04:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,244
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1000110
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SegaBarrett/pseuds/SegaBarrett
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jesse relapses, but Walter comes to help, whether Jesse wants it or not. Takes place post-4x13 before Mike comes back.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Russian Roulette

**Author's Note:**

> Disclaimer: I don't own Breaking Bad, and I make no money from this. 
> 
> A/N: Written for a prompt from capgras_syndrom on LJ: "Jesse is on drugs (heroin) again, he is hitting the bottom. On his worst day he leaves a message on Walt's answering machine, after which Walt can no longer ignore what's hapenning to Jesse.He locks Jesse up in his house and helps him to go through withdrawals and to kick the habit."

He couldn’t have pointed to a specific point, a straw that broke the camel’s back. Maybe it would have made sense if he’d said it was Brock’s poisoning, or the fact that Mike was still half-dead in Mexico, or even if he had gone back further and said that it was shooting Gale.

But it hadn’t been any of those things that had pulled Jesse towards the needle again.

It had been the dream.

He had always had vivid dreams, as long as he could remember, complex ones that seemed utterly real and didn’t really make a whole lot of logical sense. They always seemed like continuations of ones he had had before and yet hadn’t remembered, somehow. Like a TV show that started with recaps for an episode he hadn’t seen.

In this dream, he’d been lying on a bed, his bed when he lived in the duplex next to Jane, and he’d been staring up at the ceiling. He couldn’t move; the high had overtaken him and he was glued to the spot. A fingernail, bright red, appeared at his side and as the bearer of the nail came into focus, he saw that it was Jane. She spoke to him softly, invitingly, like a siren.

But he still couldn’t move. Finally, he could, and he rolled to his side and looked at her, but by now her eyes were closing and he wanted to reach out, grab hold of her, shake her and make sure she was alright, but all he could do was watch.

Then, suddenly, her arm jutted out and she grabbed his wrist, holding it tight, painfully tight, whispering accusations of “you killed me, Jesse” from lips that weren’t moving and then…

And then, he woke up. Unable to stop shaking, curled into a ball and unable to move from his spot or answer the phone when Mr. White kept calling, asking where he had been.

 _Where have you been all my life?_ his inner voice mocked. 

When he was finally able to move, it was as if possessed by some otherwordly force, some demon or something that he’d seen on TV, on some episode of _Supernatural_ maybe, and nothing seemed to resonate through his brain other than that he needed to bring that feeling back.

The not caring. The peace. The loss of the ever-increasing pressure from everything and everyone and most of all, the loss of that sense that he had failed and was destined to fail for the rest of his life.

He could just be content when he was… there.

_I’ll meet you there._

Rehab had been a wash anyway, the meetings had just driven him further into a corner after Gale. He hadn’t gone back, how could he go back after he’d cursed out the guy and admitted he’d just wanted to sell them all drugs anyway?

He wondered if Andrea had heard about that, if they could tell her what he’d said and to stay away from him, that he was bad news.

And he was. 

Broken, shattered, something that ought to be swept up and tossed into recycling or something, to be hopefully molded into a better piece, never quite up to standard but a little more adequate at least.

He needed relief.

And he knew where to get it.

*****

Maybe it was the sense that she was there with him, helping him tie off the rubber hose again, holding his arm steady again, but he felt less guilty about the whole situation than perhaps, in the logical part of his mind, he should have.

That same logical part reminded him that Mr. White would have a cow when he found out, but maybe… Maybe he didn’t have to know; after all, he didn’t really see much of him these days. He was busy with his own affairs, the car wash, his money laundering.

He pulled the hose tighter, until his vein jutted out and he could touch it, hit it like he was donating blood back in high school. He chuckled dryly at that; it had been one of those few times he’d actually done something back then for a “good cause”, and that had only been to get out of class. Mr. White’s class, actually.

The mixing came next, before the syringe, and then finally the moment of truth – he hesitated a moment, unsure – _what about what happened to Jane? Do I really want to…_ \- and even though that logical part of his brain warned _Andrea would care, Brock would, even Mr. White would care,_ the lingering doubts, that even if those things were true, they would all be better off without him anyhow, took over.

He closed his eyes when he let the syringe go. He didn’t want to see it, didn’t want to chance that being the last thing.

That thought lingered as he drifted off into a warm haze. He didn’t even notice that chill that Jane had warned him about, not this time. He was chilled enough as it was. Always cold. Always shivering nowadays, whether from not using meth anymore to the realizations that crept into his skull constantly, attached with words like _murderer_. 

Now that was all wiped clean, and all that existed was a peaceful, easy flow of… something. He couldn’t name it if he’d tried. He simply flowed through it, like water, didn’t try to control it, just floated.

He didn’t even realize it when Mr. White burst through the door, until he was acutely conscious of somebody shaking him.

“Wha?” he managed to murmur out, before rolling back over on his side. “Go away.” He couldn’t be bothered with this; what did Mr. White want, anyway? If he just left him alone for a few hours, just a few hours was all he really needed. Then he’d get back to everything, though he couldn’t remember what it was that he’d need to get back to. Something tedious, inevitably. It was always something he didn’t feel like doing. He shut his eyes. 

The hands on his shoulders didn’t go away, kept shaking him, and it was irking him. _Just leave me alone,_ he complained internally, but he didn’t even have the energy to say it aloud. 

There was a voice, a far away voice cursing him, telling him how big of an idiot he was for falling back into this thing again, and how could he be so foolish, and that Mr. White ought to just leave him here to die if that was what he wanted to do.

Jesse kept his eyes shut and mentally agreed. If he was going to die, there were worse ways to go. This oblivion wasn’t bad, not at all. 

“Jesse.” His name, over and over, and the feeling of being shaken again. Shaken hard. 

“Stop,” he whined out, but his own voice seemed as distant as Mr. White’s.

He could only mildly protest when he felt himself being picked up and carried somewhere. Where? He didn’t know, didn’t care.

He closed his eyes and drifted off to sleep. 

***

When Jesse awoke, his first realization was just how groggy he felt. Groggy, sick, and tired. He was tempted to roll back over and go back to sleep, but he was stopped by the fact that he had no idea where he actually was. 

He opened his eyes a little wider, even though it hurt to do so. The walls were red. Or maybe a sort of reddish brown. He couldn’t tell.

It felt familiar somehow. 

His parents’ house?

 _Oh God, please not that._ He couldn’t think of anything more humiliating than them staring him down again, shaking their heads at their useless son. At another failure on Jesse’s record.

_Anything but that._

He looked around a little further and realized it wasn’t his parents’ house, either. Well, that was a relief. 

It did seem familiar, though. He looked around, tried to rifle through his brain, check all the tabs and folders to see if he could figure it out. 

Then, he didn’t have to, because the door opened – he was on a bed, he soon realized that much, one with a blue and white bedspread and soft white pillows – and Mr. White walked in.

The condo. Mr. White’s condo, which meant he must be in Mr. White’s bed. Which was just altogether too weird. 

He let out a little whine of protest.

“Where am I?” he asked, though he’d already established that.

“My place,” Mr. White responded. “I see you’re awake.”

“And at your place,” Jesse repeated, slowly trying to sit up and finding it a challenge. “But why? I was at my place and now… Now, I’m here for some reason. And I feel like shit.”

“Ah, yes,” Mr. White said, the snark evident in his voice. “That would be withdrawal, because you were stupid enough to pump your veins full of poison again.” Jesse glared at him.

“And, uh why is that your business?”

“Because you called me,” Mr. White replied.

“Come again?”

“You don’t even remember?” the older man pressed. “Let me play you the message.” He supplied a cell phone, and a few presses of a button later, Jesse heard his own voice.

“Mr. White, I can’t… do this. Please. Come get me. I don’t… I’m done. Please.” 

Jesse blinked. He didn’t recall it at all. It was his voice, though, wasn’t it? His voice, begging and pleading, at the end of his rope. Begging for help he wasn’t sure he was going to get.

He didn’t know if he actually wanted it, though.

Maybe he just wanted to give up. He had been fighting for so long. This year had seemed endless and even before that, he couldn’t easily find a place where he hadn’t been plagued by _something_. Even before the drug game, the dangerous lifestyle he’d dove into with Mr. White, there had been his parents and their unrealistic expectations and his desperate attempts to cling to his aunt before she faded away. 

Maybe it just wasn’t worth it anymore.

But there had to be a part of him, some last part, that wanted to live. Otherwise, why would he have made that phone call? Maybe it had been his subconscious or something, some covered-up part that just wanted to stay alive.

He couldn’t deny it the chance, could he?

Jesse rubbed at his eyes again.

“I feel like I got run over by a truck.”

“You will,” Mr. White replied, not unsympathetically. “But it will pass.”

“Yeah, when?”

“In about forty-eight hours.”

Jesse’s eyes went wide.

“You’ve gotta be shitting me.”

Mr. White walked up and laid one knee on the bed, leaning in towards Jesse. 

“I’m not. But you’ll be fine. Maybe it will send the message.”

Jesse groaned and lay back.

“And what message is that?”

“Operant conditioning, Jesse. That when you play with heroin, you get results that are less than enjoyable,” Mr. White replied. Jesse flipped him off.

“Uh, no. If only the withdrawal sucks, doesn’t that mean that the… conditioning is to get back on it?”

“Not if you can’t get to it. Which you won’t be able to. You are not leaving this place until you’re out the other end.”

“So your plan,” Jesse began, staring at Mr. White, “is to hold me hostage?”

“Look at it this way,” Mr. White replied with a smirk, “Who are you going to complain to?”

Jesse thought about it.

“I could call your brother-in-law. Say I’m being unlawfully imprisoned.”

Mr. White pulled himself entirely up on the bed, crossing his legs.

“Yes, Jesse, Hank is going to rush out to come rescue you.”

“My parents.”

“That suggestion was made with even less enthusiasm than calling Hank.”

Jesse knotted his fingers together.

“Andrea.”

“I think she deserves better than you being drugged out of your mind. Don’t you think she’d agree?”

Jesse groaned again and grabbed a pillow, pushing it over his face.

“I can’t believe you’re making me do this. You can’t watch me all the time. I can totally make a grand escape.”

“You don’t really want to.”

“The fuck do you know about what I really want, Mr. White?” Jesse fired back. But there was a point. If anyone knew him, now, it was Walter White. And that realization was kind of depressing. 

He looked up, blue eyes wide and vulnerable. 

“I’m afraid to do this,” he admitted. The words were soft, like he didn’t want them to really be heard.

Mr. White reached out and put a hand on his shoulder, and to Jesse’s surprise, he let him.

“You’ll make it through, Jesse. I promise.”

“How do you know?” Jesse shot back, knotting his fingers together again with renewed vigor, suddenly full of restless energy he didn’t know where to place. “I fail at everything.”

“No, you don’t,” Mr. White replied simply. With that, he rose from his spot and walked out of the room.

“Uh,” Jesse called after the door swung shut, “You comin’ back at some point? Uh… Mr. White?”

***

Jesse tried to sleep. He curled up in the blanket and squinched his eyes shut, hard, but it didn’t really help. His body slowly began to feel as if he had the flu from Hell.

He didn’t know why so many people with weird and nasty medical conditions felt the need to go researching them, like that made them feel better about what was happening to them because now, tada! They understood it. 

His aunt hadn’t been like that. She didn’t have stacks of books with names like Dealing with Your Cancer and So You’ve Got Cancer – Now What? She knew what she had. She knew the timeline. The rest was just appointments and trying to make the best of it. 

Jesse had always respected that.

So even though he knew what was happening – it was just receptors in his body trying to reorganize themselves, to understand that they weren’t getting the drug anymore and that they weren’t going to and were going to have to shut up and learn to live with it – it still hurt like a bitch.

He groaned and put a hand over his head. As much as Mr. White pissed him off, he sure as hell hoped the man was planning to return. Even if he was just going to lecture Jesse some more, at least that was some kind of distraction.

Or so he said now, at least.

Anything had to be better than this. Anything. He could see why Jane had been in no hurry to quit again.

He rolled over and buried his head in a stack of pillows. Jane. Why did he have to think of her now? Why did he have to _need_ her now?

Jesse wanted to move on. Live with Andrea, help raise Brock. Maybe have a few more kids. Have a happy life.

Then why was he letting himself get drawn into all this shit again? He had enough money to just live a normal life. A safe life.

It felt so far out of reach, though.

He looked for more pillows, balanced them on his back, covered himself in them. They didn’t help.

He groaned.

This was going to be a long couple of days.

***

It seemed like hours before the door opened again, and Jesse saw Mr. White’s figure come in out of the darkness. 

“Hey,” he called. At least he was keeping his voice down. Jesse figured he ought to be thankful for small favors. He extended his hand and Jesse peeked up to see a box of Motrin.  
He rolled his eyes.

“Don’t they give you the good shit?” he grumbled. Mr. White thrust his hand forward until Jesse took the little orange box from him and placed it on the nightstand.

“The ‘good shit’, as you call it,” Mr. White began, “is mostly narcotic. In other words, would put you right back where you started from.”

“Great,” Jesse muttered. _It’s a Catch-14 or a Catch-91 or whatever it is._

“Take some Motrin, Jesse. You’ll feel better.” He walked away, and Jesse nearly panicked, nearly begged him not to go, before he returned with a small glass of water and placed it next to the box. 

Jesse reached out and tried to open the box, but found his hands were shaking too hard to get it open. Against his will, he let out a little whimper. 

Mr. White moved forward and took it from him, opened it and ripped open a small packet.

“Open,” he instructed, and to his own surprise, Jesse did. Mr. White placed the pill on his tongue before reaching out and grasping the glass in his hands. He lifted it to Jesse’s lips and nodded. 

The younger man took a drink and, with some difficulty, swallowed. His throat felt like it had been rubbed raw, and the water seemed to burn going down. He lay back on the bed and let out another groan.

“Can I get you anything?” Mr. White asked, and Jesse laughed bitterly.

“Yeah. A few days of nothing but sleep.”

He expected Mr. White to turn and leave, or make some self-righteous comment, but instead, the man took a seat on the bed. He reached out and put a hand on Jesse’s shoulder, hesitated a moment, and then pulled him into his chest.

“It’ll be okay, Jesse,” he promised. “It’s all going to be okay.”

Jesse would have thought that he’d break away, be offended at Mr. White grabbing him like this, like he was a kid who needed comforting; hell, holding him the way that Jesse would hold Brock while the little boy was recovering from the poisoning scare. 

But he didn’t. He eased into it, eyes closed, everything feeling just a little safer with the older man’s arms around him. 

“Don’t leave,” he murmured. They always left. His parents had kicked him out. His aunt had died while he still needed her so much and had left him on his own. Jane had died while he had been right there asleep next to her.

He knew Mr. White would leave, too. Had to. The man had an expiration date, albeit a stayed one. He wanted to hear the promise anyway. 

“I won’t,” Mr. White told him. “I’m right here, Jesse. You’re okay.” 

“You promise?” Jesse murmured into his chest, sucking in a breath and burying himself further against the other man. At this point he didn’t even feel sheepish about it anymore. He just had to remind himself that Mr. White was there and that at least for now, he’d stay there. 

“I promise.” 

He stayed there for a long while, the pain fading a bit with the comfort, until Mr. White slowly pulled back. 

“Do you think you can try and keep something down?” he asked. Jesse shook his head. “Try… for me?”

Jesse silently cursed his need to please.

“Sure. I’ll try.”

Mr. White’s hand reached out and clamped firmly around Jesse’s. He didn’t pull away as the older man led him, still shaking, out of the bedroom and into the dining room, into a chair. Jesse’s head hung, like it was top-heavy, and he stared at Mr. White’s table for what seemed an inordinate amount of time, like it was going to change colors on him or something. 

At some point, a plate appeared before him, with a sandwich and a little bowl of soup on it. Silverware soon joined it. 

“Thanks,” Jesse mumbled as he took the spoon and tried not to drop it into the bowl. 

Mr. White took a seat across from him, and Jesse, when he finally raised his head, spent a good amount of time just sort of staring at him. Why was he taking all this trouble, anyway? He had never cared all this much before. No one had. When he’d fallen before, he had had to pick himself up, and he’d never done a good job of it, getting the metaphoric gravel ingrained in his palms and scabs and blood streaked on his knees.

The older man wasn’t eating. He was just sitting there watching Jesse, and Jesse wasn’t sure whether it was touching or creepy or some third option that he wasn’t awake enough to try and process. Then again, when had Mr. White ever easily fit into a category at all?

Jesse sighed and managed to maneuver his spoon into his soup. It was some kind of tomato thing. It smelled okay. It was probably some Campbell’s or something, not even Progresso or whatever and certainly not those soups Cosi had that Jesse used to get back when he went there. But as far as soup went, it seemed passable.

Then again, he hadn’t even succeeded in getting it in his mouth yet. 

He scooped it up and brought it to his lips. He blew on it out of habit and slowly took a sip. 

Surprisingly, he didn’t immediately want to throw it up. This was a good sign.

He gave a small, sad smile to Mr. White and nodded.

“It’s good,” he murmured. It wasn’t all that good, but it was easier than getting all emotional and actually telling Mr. White about how relieved he was that someone actually gave a shit. It just would have seemed so pathetic. So he clung to a detail, a small detail.

Mr. White nodded. 

“Try and eat as much as you can. You need to keep your strength up,” he urged. “Just remember. A few days and you’ll be fine.”

***

That night, Jesse was exhausted but in too much pain to sleep. He ended up curled around the blanket again, whimpering as all the Motrin seemed to have worn off. He supposed he could creep into the bathroom and check the cabinet for more, but – shit, it hurt to stand, even to sit up.

And if he went rooting around Mr. White’s cabinet, then he might end up downing whatever was in there. Even if he didn’t, Mr. White might suspect he did, and Jesse just couldn’t handle that right now. He couldn’t let the man down, not ever.

Not that he could figure out why, exactly.

He leaned as far as he could out of the bed and cleared his throat, tried to find his voice. He second-guessed it ten times over before he finally called out.

“Mr. White?” The first seemed to receive no answer, so he second-guessed it yet again. After all, Mr. White might not be happy to get woken up.

God, he felt like a little kid trying to decide whether to wake up his parents after a bad dream.

“Mr. White?” he called again. His voice was slightly louder now, a little more decisive, like he’d decided on his course of action and he’d better just go with it already.   
He heard the sound of footsteps in the hall and moved his head a little farther back in his pillow. This was silly. What the hell was he actually afraid of? Of Mr. White? He’d actually have reason to be, considering what he’d seen of the man, but that didn’t seem the reason at all.

The next thing he heard was the sound of the door creaking open. He could see Mr. White’s form silhouetted in the dark, and with it came this odd sensation of seeing him for the first time. The last time he had slept at the condo, he’d been so dazed that most of it didn’t register. He had just gotten out of rehab and had felt so dead inside that it had been like sleepwalking for weeks, calling Jane’s phone every five minutes, desperate to hear her voice.

If Mr. White disappeared, would he do the same? After this disease finally claimed his life, would Jesse sit and dial a number, clinging to the few vestiges left of what he’d left behind?  
What _would_ he even be leaving behind?

Jesse didn’t know. He was too tired, too painfully, razor-sharply awake to figure it out now.

“Mr. White,” he called again. The figure shifted, stepped forward, and Jesse swallowed, the self-consciousness and nervousness coming back to hit him again.   
He must have closed his eyes, because the older man appeared in an instant, sitting by the side of the bed and looking down at Jesse, just looking. It was as if his eyes were hovering against the dark. A simple glow. A night-light – no, that was too weird a thought and maybe veering too dangerously close to what Jesse actually needed right now and what he wasn’t really sure he could get from Walter White.

“Hey,” Mr. White called softly, and in another flash his hand was on Jesse’s shoulder. 

“Hey,” Jesse replied. “I hope I didn’t, uh, wake you.”

The older man shook his head. 

“I was up anyway.”

“Oh. Okay,” Jesse whispered. “Sorry, I was just… I think all the pills wore off.”

“I can get you some more,” Mr. White offered.

“No, I… Could you just sit with me instead? That’d… I think that would help. Could you?” Jesse felt as if he was tripping over his tongue with every word. 

“Sure.” Mr. White’s response was a little uneasy, as if they were standing at the tip of some ledge, together, and they were desperately close to tumbling over it. But what? 

Sure, this was intense, but was it somehow more than that? Was there something Jesse wanted from him?

He shook his head, not realizing he was doing it for real until Mr. White asked about it.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. Just thinking.” Jesse’s voice was soft. “I guess… Just about how history repeats itself. Me. Living with you again. Having screwed up again, you know?” Mr. White shrugged.

“We’ll fix it.”

Jesse swallowed hard and looked at the older man.

“Will we?”

***

Jesse must have passed out at some point. When he came to, he was in a cold sweat. Mr. White was still sitting by the bed, and he had to wonder if the man had slept at all, or had somehow spent the rest of the night watching over him.

He was surprised to find the thought more comforting than creepy. Like Mr. White actually did want to take care of him, like he’d said. It had been so long since someone had cared about him like that. 

Jesse opened his eyes a little wider.

“Hey, Mr. White.” He groaned, reaching over to wipe some spit off of his lips. He must have been drooling in his sleep. Nasty.

“Morning, Jesse,” the older man replied, climbing off the bed with an awkward step. “Do you feel up to eating anything?”

Jesse considered it. His stomach still felt kind of like a rock had been dropped on it, but there was also a strange emptiness inside, too. He had no idea which impulse to go with. 

“Yeah. I guess. But not anything really big.”

“Why don’t I make you some soup?” Mr. White suggested. “Some chicken noodle or something?” Jesse looked up and nodded gratefully, as the older man turned to walk away.

“Wait,” Jesse called.

“Yeah?” Mr. White replied.

“How come you’re being so nice to me?”

Mr. White shrugged.

“Better late than never, right?”

***

Jesse managed to slump over to the dining room table and sit down without wanting to cry, and he figured that was a small victory in and of itself. Why hadn’t he remembered how awful withdrawal had been the last time? Maybe he just didn’t learn; maybe that was it.

Because that seemed to be his M.O. these days. He was that person who would keep putting his hand on the flame, even though it burned. 

He was worthless.

“Jesse. Hey.” Mr. White’s voice cut through his thoughts. “How are you holding up?” 

“I don’t know,” Jesse admitted. He stared at the table. Why was Mr. White even wasting his time trying to help Jesse? He ought to just let him go overdose and be done with it. “It doesn’t hurt as much now, but I still don’t feel… right.”

Mr. White’s hand moved to Jesse’s shoulder, and he squeezed it. 

“It’s going to take a little while. You know that.”

Jesse nodded.

“Yeah.” He paused and reached up, rubbing at his nose and ears, as if to remind himself that he was really here and it wasn’t all just some fiction he had imagined. Though he didn’t know why, if he could have chosen a life, he would ever choose this one. This life sucked. “So why are you doing all this, Mr. White? For real. You don’t need to take care of me. You could’ve just let me tank. Why do you even care?” Mr. White’s hand seemed to come out of nowhere and place itself on Jesse’s cheek.

“Because I care about you,” he said simply. 

“Why?”

“Why wouldn’t I?” Mr. White sighed in exasperation. “Come on, Jesse. I don’t want to hear you down yourself again.” He stood up. “I’ll just get you some soup and then you’ll feel a little better. You need something in your stomach. You’re getting closer to being out the other end of this, okay?”

“But what’s next?” Jesse mumbled, interlacing his fingers with each other. “When I’m out the other end, what do I do next?”

“Well, that’s up to you,” Mr. White told him as he walked towards the kitchen. “You can do whatever you want. Get a job, go to college. Live with Andrea and help with Brock.” At the mention of their names, Jesse rubbed a hand over his face, and when Mr. White returned, Jesse looked back at him.

“I love that kid,” he whispered, “Love him more than anything in the world. But what kind of role model am I? I’m just a junkie loser.”

Mr. White shrugged, putting the bowl of soup down in front of Jesse.

“Does Brock have a dad around?” Jesse shook his head.

“Never seen him.”

“Then sounds to me like a junkie loser dad’s better than none at all.”

Jesse shook his head.

“No it’s not. No, he deserves the best.”

“Then give him the best, Jesse,” Walt told him. Jesse picked up the spoon with shaking hands. It was like he could taste the metal somehow. Everything was making him nauseous. 

“How?”

“Just be yourself, Jesse. I know you love him. Just keep showing him. Hug him when he’s sad. Smile when he’s happy. That’s what you do. That’s all that you need to do.”

Jesse looked up. Was it really that easy? Could it be? He thought back to his own childhood, to his own parents. How old had he been when it had finally all gone wrong? Had he ever been held the way he wanted to hold Brock, told that he was perfect and loved even if he messed up? He didn’t know. He knew there was a deep longing for that, though. Something that pervaded every bone in his body, something that held him so tight that he couldn’t breathe. Something that had made him follow Mr. White no matter where he might have led, even into death.

“I wish it were that easy,” he whispered to Mr. White. “I’m not any good at… anything.”

“You’re good at that, Jesse,” Mr. White told him. “You’re good with kids. You’re patient with them. Gentle. I’ve seen how you brighten when you talk about Brock. He’s your everything. You’re fine. What you need to do now is get yourself better again. And first you need to eat.”

Jesse slowly scooped up a bit of soup and brought it to his mouth. Some of it he spilled, but he was surprised to find what actually got into his mouth was still warm. It tasted strangely good, better than soup should have really tasted. He wondered if it were actually Mr. White’s words affecting him; it probably was. Somehow the man just had that way about him, where he could build Jesse up or shatter him to pieces with a simple sentence. Jesse wondered if he could be like that one day, or whether that was just saved for the Heisenbergs of the world. The smart ones, the ruthless ones. The people like Mr. White or like Gus. The ones who never seemed to have any fear, not really.

“That’s good, Jesse,” Mr. White encouraged. “You need to eat. Keep up your strength. You can fight this, you can get through this.”

Jesse’s eyes went wide as he took another spoonful of soup.

“Why are you being so nice to me?” he asked quietly. “You’re not…” He trailed off, but Mr. White had to know what he meant – he wasn’t mocking him or yelling at him, telling him he wasn’t good enough, calling him a useless junkie. All of the things Jesse had come to expect from Mr. White at every turn, except… except for that time after Jane when he had held him and told him he hadn’t killed Jane, that it would be okay.

“Because… Jesse…” Mr. White trailed off, as if the words were a mystery to him, or if maybe even the actions were. Jesse didn’t press further. Maybe it was better if there wasn’t a reason, wasn’t some kind of Mr. White ulterior motive, if Mr. White was just being kind because, somehow in some way that didn’t even make any sense, Jesse deserved it. He couldn’t fathom it, couldn’t quite figure it out, but he hoped it still, with a feeling that was almost painful in its sudden intensity.

Jesse just looked at him.

“Thank you,” he whispered. He tried to eat all of the soup, hard as the motions were. Everything felt fuzzy and heavy. But he felt protected, like something strong and a little overpowering was clamped around him, holding him so tight and making sure he couldn’t go anywhere. Making sure he couldn’t hurt himself. “Thank you… for… letting me stay.”

Mr. White seemed, somehow, and for once, to understand all that Jesse wanted to tell him but couldn’t. All of the regrets, the strange gratitude, the need. 

Somehow, Jesse finished the soup, and he immediately regretted the loss of the prop, of the thing he could use to avoid saying anymore to Mr. White considering that he had no idea what he really wanted to say, what he really needed to say.

“Here, Jesse, you want to rest now?” Mr. White asked, “We can go back up to the bed.”

Jesse cocked his head to the side. Had the man really said “we”, in the meanings that Jesse was attaching to it, or had he simply meant that Jesse could, that Jesse could sleep while Mr. White went to go do something else, something less messy and emotional?

“Can we?” Jesse responded, the “we” coming out a little more defined than he really would have liked. 

“Yes, we can,” Mr. White told him. “Here, let me take your arm.” Jesse stood on shaky legs and Mr. White, as promised, took his arm in his own. He led him towards the bedroom, even guided him on to the bed. “Lay down. I’m here.”

Jesse swallowed hard. It was difficult not to cry, not to burst into tears and just utterly break down, but he knew it would hurt if he did; it would take far too much energy.

To Jesse’s relief, Mr. White laid down right next to him, letting him curl up alongside him.

“How are you feeling?” Mr. White whispered, “Is the pain starting to fade?”

“It’s better,” Jesse admitted, then shyly added, “But that might be ‘cause you’re here. You feel all… all warm and stuff.” He wondered at it – what the hell were they doing here? Were they really still just friends considering that right now, they seemed to be straight-up cuddling? But Jesse was too tired to battle with himself over it. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and fell asleep again.

***

Jesse’s dream that night was one of the first good ones he had had in a long, long time. In this dream, he was nestled next to Mr. White on a big, fluffy mattress. There was a kitten curled up in the corner of the bed, and it was sleeping, its little chest rising and falling. He wanted to touch it, but just the same he was terrified that he would hurt the little creature. 

He felt safe, though, and so he stayed where he was. It was all so warm. He wanted to watch the beauty. He wanted to stay where it was safe. He hadn’t felt this way in so long. Everything else seemed fake, like he had been walking through a dream for a long time now and he had only just woken up. He had only just realized what his life was supposed to be. What his life could be.  
There had been pain before, and part of his brain remembered, and was tapping out like a little rhythm, a perfect rhythm in Morse code that his heart was refusing to listen to. 

And then he woke up. He very slowly realized that the warmth he had felt was real. He was wrapped in someone’s arms, though it took him a while to try and figure out whose. Strong arms. Arms that weren’t budging. He could smell sweat. There was a blanket draped over him.

“Mr. White,” Jesse whispered. He didn’t know whether to wriggle out of the embrace or not. Instead, he wondered, when did this happen? Yet he didn’t even know quite what he meant by “this” – the sleeping so close together or the not feeling weird about it? The strange familiarity of it. 

His mind was reeling. He both loved and hated it at the same time. On one hand, he just wanted Mr. White to hurry up and leave, or die, or do whatever everyone else seemed to always want to do to and about Jesse. To get up and leave him behind in a mess. The mess he could never escape from. To break his heart, because right now Jesse wasn’t sure if it had ever been unbroken.

The other part wanted to cling. Wanted to know that, even if this was going to change, that this was real. But real things… what he thought was real… it all seemed to always fall apart before too long. Everything with Jane, and now with Andrea… it was all one big mess and it seemed like it always would be. What would make this any different? The fact that he and Mr. White had been… partners? The fact that Mr. White was yet again putting up with Jesse’s monumental failures at life? What?

Jesse snuggled up closer to Mr. White, wondering if he would yell at him. Maybe he hadn’t intended for all of this. Jesse certainly hadn’t… maybe it was all in Jesse’s head.

“Mr. White,” he whispered again, nudging the older man with his foot. Mr. White slept like an old fat cat, curled in a way that seemed to dare anyone to try to move him from his chosen spot. When he opened one eye, he seemed like a cat still, mildly annoyed. 

“Jesse?” he murmured. Jesse shuffled his feet. He could smell sweat coming off of the both of them, but it was a strangely homey smell. One he didn’t want to leave right away, especially as he was somehow aware that once the odd warm feeling went away, the nausea and pain would replace it.

For a while, it had all been worth it. Taking away the ability to feel. The drugs let him coast, let him slide. And he hadn’t cared if the next hit would be his last, because there wasn’t any reason to hold on after Jane had died. Then after Tomas, and after everything else had fallen to shit. After Jesse had managed to check off every single failure in the book. He had been worthless, and worthless people didn’t deserve anything. Didn’t deserve peace, and certainly didn’t deserve love. 

But maybe he wanted to deserve love. Maybe it would be nice to deserve love. To hold someone close and know that they didn’t want to ever leave you – Jesse sighed as he realized that qualification was necessary. Even if Mr. White didn’t want to leave… even if he truly wanted to stay with Jesse - and how could Jesse assume that he did? – Mr. White would leave. The illness that had been rotting his insides away for so many months now, even if it had stopped, would take him from Jesse, if a bullet didn’t or if some other horror didn’t. 

“Mr. White, why are we…” Jesse’s words came out breathy, short. He didn’t know what he wanted to do. He wanted to reach out, ask for help. He wanted to become the person he needed to be, wanted to be a person that Mr. White wouldn’t regret having helped. But he had no way to go about doing that. “This is…” He looked for a word. The right word. Where was the right word? “This is… nice.” It was more than nice. But that’s what he had. 

“That’s good, Jesse,” Mr. White mumbled in response. “Are you feeling any better?”

“Yes,” Jesse admitted. “I’m feeling a lot better. I… it feels good to be near you. It’s nice… and warm near you.” Maybe he was just out of it. Maybe that was why he was actually saying these things instead of thinking them and then regretting them. 

“That’s good, Jesse.” Mr. White reached back and stroked Jesse’s hair, almost pet him like he was a cat. Jesse let out a soft noise. Maybe it was a purr. Either way, Mr. White seemed to realize that Jesse liked it, and so he did it again. And again. Jesse leaned into the soft touch with a longing he hadn’t known existed. 

“I want to be good for you.” He didn’t know where the words came from, only that they were truer than anything he had said, anything he had known for a very long time. He wanted Mr. White to always be with him, always touch him like that. 

Maybe he loved him. Love was a scary thing; he had loved Jane, loved her with all his heart and she had been taken away from him so cruelly, faster than he could blink and before he could even begin to say goodbye. 

“You need to be good for yourself,” Mr. White told him firmly. “You need to be good to yourself.”

“I don’t know how to do that,” Jesse admitted. He hadn’t taken care of himself, really focused on himself, in so long. Even in rehab, it had just been interconnected steps, like playing connect the dots. He had done it so he could get out and after he got out, he didn’t even know what else was left. There had been a hole in his heart, a burning, since Jane. Since he’d decided that he hated himself with a passion. 

“I could help,” Mr. White suggested. He drew Jesse into a kiss. “We could work together.”

“Thought we’ve _been_ working together,” Jesse whispered when the older man came up for air.

Mr. White just chuckled and hugged Jesse tight. Everything felt just a little brighter then. Maybe it could stay that way.

**The End**


End file.
